AMAZINGLY, Steve Ogier has been as calm as a mill pond over the weekend.

Obviously, anyone who has watched, or more likely heard, the island boss on the sidelines when he is coaching knows that that is bound to change come 2.30pm today at Springfield as he goes into the biggest match of his managerial career.

Yet, speaking just a few days before local sport’s main event of the year, Ogier had an almost unusual placidity about him.

‘I’m fine, not nervous at all,’ said Ogier on Thursday, in the first of half-a-dozen interviews he was due to give within the time it takes to play a football match.

‘We had two good sessions this week. The lads were positive and working well. Because it is the Muratti, there is a bit of hype, which is new to me, but I am looking forward to it.’

The Guernsey squad were due to have a final training session on Friday night but nothing too taxing was planned by Ogier and his assistant, Paul Ockleford.

‘This week we have just been working on a few things, a few patterns of play within a game. We will work on a couple of set moves but we are not going to over-complicate things.

‘Ockey and I have tried to work on movement of players both on and off the ball. We are just going over stuff, refreshing on a few things and adding a few new ideas.

‘All we want to do is trust the players to do the right thing in the right area at the right time.

‘All you can do as coaches is prepare them; they are the ones out on the pitch,’ said Ogier.

He and Ockleford have brought their own style of management to the island squad this season.

Both are great students of the game and Ogier acknowledged that the players had been introduced to quite a fresh approach, to which they will not have been used.

However, he emphasised that far from trying to change the way they played as individuals, he wanted their own talents to shine through.

‘The players have responded well to the new ideas,’ he said.

‘They have tried to do what we have asked of them but we have asked them to express themselves as well. After all, they get picked on the basis of what they have done for their clubs so you want them to continue doing those things. What we are trying to do is add bits and pieces to their game.’

So after a season in charge applying his own slant to coaching the island’s best, how does he think it has gone?

‘Generally, I am satisfied. When you look at the record when we have been playing against sides in the SWCC, we scraped a draw in Wiltshire and against the Navy when we showed great fighting quality. The players had a never-say-die attitude and they got rewarded.

‘Against Devon, although they were far the better side, we just did not perform as a team and the way we lost that game was disgraceful, I think.

‘But the players responded well against Gloucester-shire and we won our last game [ASSA Pays du Dropt] against a different type of side.’

Ogier is still upset by that 3-0 defeat to Devon. He put it down to a one-off disastrous performance but said ‘you cannot have that in SWCC football’.

When looking ahead to today’s inter-insular clash and the matter of the starting team, that clash again comes back to haunt him because it made him have to re-think several positions.

But he and Ockleford know their XI and they will attempt to play decent football at the decree of their coaches.

‘There will be a lot of passion and commitment, that’s natural, but we would like to see some composure and a little bit more thought going into the game.’

Ogier believed, with Jersey’s team being based around a nucleus of Scottish players who he described as ‘a good footballing side’, that the Muratti had the potential to be an entertaining spectacle for the supporters.

He picked out, in particular, Ross Crick and David Brodie as threats and admitted that home advantage should make the reds favourites but he is not overly worried by the Caesareans.

‘We will respect them like any side we play and they have got players who, if they can perform on the day, will pose problems.

‘I am not one for saying we will just look at ourselves and not worry about the opposition; you have got to take other players into consideration. You do not change the whole system of play because of them, but you can do something within a game to nullify their ability.

‘We will not fear playing them, though, and the boys are in pretty buoyant mood. Going into the game, Dave [Matthews, Jersey manager] will be confident his lads will perform and I am no different. I would like to think there are players in our squad who are match-winners and Jersey, I am sure, feel likewise.’

If that is what Ogier thinks, there is something he knows all too well – his first season as Guernsey coach will be judged on this one match.

‘That’s human nature, that’s what Guernsey-Jersey matches are about. Losing is not an option in this game. For supporters, no matter if it is a dire 1-0 or a thrilling 4-3, winning is everything.’